Hiding From the Light. Barbara Erskine

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СКАЧАТЬ to keep it on. Don’t want it. No way. And I need the money. I thought people would like a haunted house. Someone told me there was a market for such like. But, no one has gone for it yet.’

      Joe glanced at Mark and winked. So, they had finally got there. The old bugger was making it up. He thought he’d get a better price for the shop if it had a famous ghost. Mark hid his irritation. This wouldn’t do a lot for the credibility of the programme.

      ‘Thanks, Stan. I think that’s all we need for now.’

      ‘Right.’ Stan moved away from the stairs with alacrity. ‘I’ll leave you to it, then. Just you remember I want you out of here by tomorrow. There’s a new tenant moving in Monday.’

      ‘Stan!’ Mark called suddenly as the old man moved towards the door. ‘What about the other part of the house. The shop next door. Isn’t that haunted, too?’

      Stan shrugged. ‘Never heard that it was. They only walked the witches here, see.’ He jerked his thumb towards the stairs. ‘Never took them to the nicer side of the house. That’s where the family lived. Couldn’t hear them scream from that side of the house!’

      There was a long silence after he had gone.

      Colin eased the heavy camera off his shoulder and put it down with a groan as Alice closed the door behind their interviewee and stood watching him walk out of sight.

      ‘Christ, only one more day! I thought we’d got a week at least,’ Mark complained as Joe began to coil up his cables. ‘He told me it’s going to be an end-of-line discount shop, this and that, probably most of it fallen off the backs of lorries – just till Christmas. You’d think they could give us a bit longer.’

      ‘We can do it.’ Colin retrieved the clipboard from Alice. ‘If we spend the whole day at it tomorrow – and there’s always tonight, of course.’ He grinned at her. ‘After all, ghosts appear at night, don’t they?’ He sighed. ‘I was more worried about his remarks about ghosts being a selling point. What do you think? Have we wasted the whole afternoon? If he’s made all this up, the programme has gone. Damn! If he hadn’t said that!’

      ‘We’ll cut that bit,’ Joe said. He was lighting up a cigarette.

      Mark shook his head slowly. ‘We’d still know he’d said it.’

      ‘I think he’s telling the truth.’ Alice hauled herself up onto the counter and sat, swinging her legs. ‘That last bit was awful – how they couldn’t hear them scream in the other half of the house.’

      Mark shrugged. He was inclined to agree with Alice. ‘The trouble is, he’s after a quick sale. But perhaps it’s backfired on him a bit. People like ghosts, but not these particular ghosts. Not to live with. I’m afraid the shop’s history, if it’s true, will put purchasers off. Still,’ he paused and gave a wry grin, ‘I suppose when one thinks about it, for our purposes, it could add credibility to the film.’ He walked across to Alice. ‘Let’s see the interview list. We’ve got two more today. Out and about. I wonder if we should reschedule them and concentrate on this place for now. There’s a couple more tomorrow. That’s fine. We can do atmosphere here. Then we want corroboration and a few shots of Colchester Castle and its dungeons – you checked for permissions for that, Alice? Good. Then that should about do it. Nice piece. OK, folks. Let’s get some film in, of the attic and the first floor. The shadows are moving round a bit now. It’ll look a bit more spooky. That’s what Emma called it. Spooky. And that was unprompted.’ He smiled at the recollection. ‘Then we can get some street shots. OK?’

      As they busied themselves collecting camera, lights and clipboard a shadow appeared on the staircase by the newel post in the corner where the dusty oak steps disappeared out of sight. Alice glanced round sharply. But it had gone almost as soon as it had appeared.

      None of them noticed the sound of footsteps on the dirty boards upstairs.

       9

      Out at sea the wind had dropped. The waves rose and fell in an uneasy swell, lapping around the Gunfleet Sands. On the shore a man walking his dog in the last of the light along the beach at Frinton stopped and stared at the North Sea. Where, minutes before, he had seen the distant horizon wreathed in a rack of stormy cloud and the waves breaking over the shallows, suddenly he could see nothing. He frowned uneasily. The sky was changing colour as he watched. It was turning a thick dirty yellow. The air was becoming colder and suddenly he could smell deep ocean currents and salt, the smell of northern seas, the smell of the ice floes. The man’s dog noticed. It had abandoned its excited sniffing of the weed and shells on the sand and was standing beside him, staring out as he was. It lifted a front paw, pointing, its ears cocked, then glanced up at him, seeking reassurance. The man shrugged his shoulders uneasily. ‘Time to go home, boy,’ he said quietly. The dog needed no second telling. With an unhappy yelp it turned tail and headed towards the low cliffs and the greensward above. Within minutes the mist had reached the edge of the beach. The cold clammy air lapped at the man’s heels. In it he could hear echoes of different places, different times. The distant call of a horn, the shouts of angry men. He turned for a second, terrified; he had imagined it, of course. The smell of the haar, and the swiftness of its arrival, had unnerved him.

      Just for an instant he wondered if he could see the curved cruel beak of a boat surging in on the tide. But no, there was nothing there.

      As he turned away to follow his dog up the cliff he shivered with fear. The evil was in the mist.

      Behind him it swept in along the coast and around into the estuary heading up river towards Mistley and Manningtree. Within minutes the whole peninsula was shrouded in cold, clammy fog.

       10

       Saturday night

      ‘You have done what?’

      Piers stared at Emma with disconcerting intensity.

      ‘I’ve made an offer. The cottage in Mistley.’ She had arrived back home just before ten to find him sitting alone in the roof garden listening to the soft strains of a string quartet, a glass of white wine on the wrought-iron table near him. The cats were asleep on the sofa swing. The hot night was velvet up here, not black, no London night was black. It was bitter, dark orange, scented with traffic fumes and chargrilling from dozens of terraces and rooftops and flowers from the park and the squares and a thousand small expensive gardens. A breath of cold wind trailed past them and was gone, leaving them staring at one another in silence.

      Piers sat down and reached for his glass. ‘Forgive me, Emma, but I thought I heard you say you had bought a cottage. I must be going mad.’

      ‘You did hear me, Piers.’ Her confidence was evaporating fast. She sat down beside him and kicked off her sandals. Her ankle was still slightly swollen. ‘You will love it, I promise. I had to make the decision. There was someone else after it.’ She rubbed her face with her hands, exhausted after the long drive. ‘Can I have some wine?’

      ‘We’d both better have some wine.’ Piers’s voice was tight with anger. ‘Then perhaps you can explain.’

      But how could she explain? The certainty. The fear of losing it. The knot of panic-stricken, СКАЧАТЬ